If you’re heading to the Vancouver Winter Olympics and want to make inexpensive calls back to the U.S., the solution could be as near as your portable MP3 player.
Vonage Mobile offers inexpensive worldwide calling—anywhere there’s a Wi-Fi signal—by turning an iPod Touch into a phone. It also works on the iPhone and BlackBerry models. And the one-cent a minute rate between the U.S. and Canada is hard to beat.
Besides Vonage Mobile—a free download from the Apple app store—all that’s needed to turn the iPod Touch into a phone is is a wireless connection and a headphone set with a microphone (such as V-MODA’s Vibe II or Faze). The program for other platforms can be downloaded from Vonage Mobile’s website.
As long as there is a Wi-Fi signal, Vonage Mobile makes a VoIP connection for international calls—you’re talking over the Internet. That means if you’re using it on an iPhone or BlackBerry, it does not use cellular minutes. (Note: The iPod Touch will not receive incoming calls.)
Installing the program is quick and easy. Vonage’s World Mobile plan offers unlimited calling to more than 60 countries for $24.99 a month and competitive rates to other parts of the world. Vonage also offers a pay-per-use plan by adding funds to your account, in advance, with a credit card.
Other per-minute rates range from two cents between the U.S. and Hong Kong to $13.92 to a UPT (Universal Personal Telecommunications) number. I was also able to make calls within the US with my iPod Touch.
The call quality with Vonage Mobile is good. In fact, I’d pick it over another mobile VoIP service, Skype. While Skype has worked well for me on a PC, I’ve been disappointed with its implementation, call quality and other issues on mobile devices. The results will depend, of course, on the quality of the wireless signal and the headset/microphone used.
After a query from the Federal Communications Commission, AT&T announced in October that it was opening its cellular network to allow VoIP apps to run on its 3G and 2G data channels, instead of just Wi-Fi. With that, I expect we’ll see more and improved VoIP programs for smartphones—and iPods and maybe the iPad, too—in the future.
#1 by Andy Mesa - February 9th, 2010 at 12:38
Skype offers unlimited calling in the US for $3/mo and $10/mo internationally. Google Voice has free calling in the US, similar rates internationally. iCall actually lets you switch cell calls into data calls so it may be the easiest choice at $9/mo and fring lets you use any number of services, the latter two work over 3G.
Vonage is an also-ran.
#2 by Andy Mesa - February 9th, 2010 at 12:39
TruPhone’s call quality seems to be the best of the lot that I’ve tried.
#3 by Frequent Caller - February 9th, 2010 at 21:56
It should be duly noted that the Vonage iphone app that runs over wifi offers completely 100% free calling to US domestic numbers over wifi. If you have an iphone with a US AT&T plan or an iPod Touch, use of the Vonage app via wifi to call any US domestic number is not 1 cent/min… it’s completely free. In fact you can call any domestic number in the US from any wifi connection in any country anywhere (barring any potential local regulatory restrictions). I’ve read that Vonage’s free US domestic calling works everywhere from Mexico to South Africa.
Skype doesn’t do that, nor does iCall, nor does Truphone.
Don’t believe me, download the app, turn your phone to airplane mode, and check it out yourself.
Also-ran my ass.